Paul Graham

Articles

• You Weren't Meant to Have a Boss   view details
  "So working in a group of 10 people within a large organization feels both right and wrong at the same time. On the surface it feels like the kind of group you're meant to work in, but something major is missing. A job at a big company is like high fructo

• Apple's Mistake   view details
  "The way Apple runs the App Store has harmed their reputation with programmers more than anything else they've ever done. Their reputation with programmers used to be great. ... There are a couple reasons they should care. One is that these users are th

• Maker's Schedule, Manager's Schedule   view details
  "There are two types of schedule, which I'll call the manager's schedule and the maker's schedule. The manager's schedule is for bosses. It's embodied in the traditional appointment book, with each day cut into one hour intervals. ... When you're operating on the maker's schedule, meetings are a disaster. A single meeting can blow a whole afternoon, by breaking it into two pieces each too small to do anything hard in."

Author Quotes

• For [a product] to surprise me, it must be satisfying expectations I didn't know I had. No focus group is going to discover those. Only a great designer can.

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• Dressing up is inevitably a substitute for good ideas. It is no coincidence that technically inept business types are known as \"suits.\"

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• Nerds don't just happen to dress informally. They do it too consistently. Consciously or not, they dress informally as a prophylactic measure against stupidity.

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• You can't write or program well in units of an hour. That's barely enough time to get started. When you're operating on the maker's schedule, meetings are a disaster.

  We know we have to have some number of meetings. All we ask from those on the manager's schedule is that they understand the cost.

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  Maker's Schedule, Manager's Schedule